In January, Eastern Consolidated announced the $38-mil-
lion sale of Stonehenge 56, a 90,000-square-foot, 95-unit
residential/retail building at 401 W. 56th St., on behalf of
Stonehenge Partners Inc., led by Ofer J. Yardeni and Joel
Seiden. Alan Miller, principal and senior director at Eastern
Consolidated, represented Stonehenge, while senior director Peter Carillo procured the buyer, an affiliate of Orin
Management.

“Elevatored apartment buildings in Manhattan happen to
be the most desirable investment properties to acquire, yet
Ofer Yardeni decided to engage Eastern Consolidated to sell
the property the old fashioned way,” says Miller. “Targeting
only those investors that could handle a transaction of this
size, and making telephone calls one by one to a list that was
very short, constituted the beginning of my ‘under the radar’
sales effort.” An additional early obstacle in the yearlong marketing effort was the fact that the property went on the block
without an asking price.

“People seem to still be buying Manhattan real estate
because it is considered safe and reliable, especially given the

“But buyers are getting slightly ahead of the fundamentals
given the slow rate of job growth, rent growth and other
uncertainty from the global economy,” he continues. This is
particularly evident in the case of office buildings, which have
seen a jump in volume since March, including nearly 30 sales
of $100 million or more, “all while rents have barely budged,”
Hauspurg says. Sales of multifamily buildings have increased
as well. u